The Meat Armor Incident
—A Few Days Earlier—
The monster's roar shattered the silence of the tunnel.
I ran.
No strategy. No plan. Just legs pumping, lungs burning, heart hammering so hard I could taste copper.
The thing behind me was massive—some kind of bear-wolf hybrid with too many teeth and not enough mercy. Each of its footsteps shook dust from the ceiling. Every breath it took sounded like a furnace door slamming open behind me.
I'm going to die I'm going to die I'm going to die—
My vision blurred at the edges.
And then—
The footsteps slowed.
Stopped.
I kept running for three more strides before my brain caught up with reality. My feet stumbled. I spun around, chest heaving like a broken bellows.
The monster stood there.
Twenty feet away.
Its head tilted to one side.
It sniffed the air.
Once.
Twice.
A third time, like it couldn't quite believe what it wasn't smelling.
Then it scratched behind its ear with a hind leg.
Like a confused dog.
We locked eyes.
Me: wheezing, soaked in cold sweat, probably smelling like three weeks' worth of dungeon grime and desperation.
It: genuinely baffled.
The monster took one cautious step forward.
Paused.
Looked at me harder, as if trying to find something that should have been there but wasn't.
Behind those yellow eyes, I could practically see the instinctual calculations running.
Energy spent: High
Risk: Moderate
Potential reward—
It squinted.
…Where's the reward?
Then it just… turned around.
And walked away.
Not fled.
Not retreated.
Dismissed me.
"Hey!" The word burst out before I could stop it. "That's rude!"
The monster didn't even glance back.
I stood there, gasping for breath, watching it lumber down the tunnel like it had suddenly remembered a much more interesting appointment somewhere else.
What the hell just happened?
My hands were still shaking. Adrenaline made everything feel distant and razor sharp at the same time.
I looked down.
My shirt hung off my frame like a borrowed coat. My pants were cinched tight with a belt I'd punched two extra holes into last week.
My arms—
Gods.
When did they start looking like that?
All tendon and bone. The muscle definition I'd been building just… gone.
Almost a month in the dungeon.
Almost a month of rationing.
Of splitting one meal into three.
Of saying "I'll eat more tomorrow."
I didn't look like a beggar.
Not literally.
But I definitely looked like someone who had been forgetting to eat.
Someone surviving.
Not living.
"Hey!" I shouted down the empty tunnel, my voice cracking slightly.
"I have meat! I'm made of meat!"
Silence answered.
Then the thought crept in.
Uninvited.
Inevitable.
I always thought Bell survived this long because of plot armor.
I blinked.
Felt my ribs through my shirt.
Felt the hollow ache in my stomach that wasn't just hunger.
Wait.
No.
The realization dropped into my mind like a stone into still water.
"…Meat armor."
I stood there, the words hanging in the darkness.
"…Or lack of it."
The monster had done the math.
Chasing me? High effort.
Catching me? Moderate risk.
Eating me?
…Barely worth the calories.
I had survived because I was too pathetic to bother hunting.
"…I really need to eat more."
***